Pontos Aqua Holdings announced it hired Francisco Saraiva Gomes as CEO.
Gomes is an executive specializing in the aquaculture industry. Throughout his career, he has managed a variety of businesses across aquaculture, both by species and geography. Gomes brings Pontos Aqua unique strategic and operational insight into the industry’s drivers and opportunities. Prior to joining Pontos Aqua, he led the aquaculture business at Novus International Inc., and he sits on the Board of Directors of the World Aquaculture Society.
Based in New York, Pontos Aqua was formed in May 2014 to make and manage investments in the global aquaculture and seafood industry. Certain private investment partnerships advised by Tinicum Incorporated have made an initial equity commitment to Pontos Aqua totaling USD 75 million (EUR 56 million).
Pontos Aqua intends to invest in businesses that provide real and sustainable value within the aquaculture and seafood supply chain, businesses that can be enhanced by its operational, strategic and financial support. Pontos Aqua is seeking investment opportunities in the range of USD 5 million (EUR 3.7 million) to USD 75 million.
“Aquaculture is a rapidly growing industry with exciting global investment opportunities. We are thrilled to partner with such an experienced and well regarded industry executive as Dr. Saraiva Gomes,” said Richard Dosik, a principal at Tinicum.
“I’m rather enthusiastic. Pontos Aqua is in a unique position to contribute to the growth promise of the industry. Our goal is to invest in high quality businesses throughout the global value chain. While benefiting from a flexible investment mandate, we will focus on companies with solid management teams and growing revenue streams that operate in bottleneck sectors of the industry,” said Gomes. “Raw materials, equipment and services, animal health, feeds and selected aspects of farming are some of the segments where we believe we can help unlock operational value.”
